quarter

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈkwɔːtə/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈk(w)ɔɹ.tɚ/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔː(ɹ)tə(ɹ)

Via French quartier, from Latin quartarius, from quartus. Compare Spanish cuarto (“room, quarters; quarter”).

quarter (not comparable)

1. Pertaining to an aspect of a quarter.
2. (chiefly) Consisting of a fourth part, a quarter (1/4, 25%).

   a quarter hour; a quarter century; a quarter note; a quarter pound

3. (chiefly) Related to a three-month term, a quarter of a year.

   A quarter day is one terminating a quarter of the year.

   A quarter session is one held quarterly at the end of a quarter.

• quadruple

Often used in a combining form quarter-.

quarter (countable and uncountable, plural quarters)

1. Any fourth of something, particularly:
   1. A quarter-dollar, divided into 25 cents; the coin of that value minted in the United States or Canada.
   2. (now chiefly financial) A quarter of the year, 3 months; a season.
   3. (historical) The quarter-ton or tun, divided into 8 bushels, the medieval English unit of volume and weight named by the Magna Carta as the basis for measures of wine, ale, and grain
      • 1882, James Edwin Thorold Rogers, A History of Agriculture and Prices in England, volume 4, page 204:

        One of these is 1 Hen. V, cap. 10, defining the quarter of corn [i.e., grain] to be eight struck bushels, and putting fines on purveyors who take more.

   4. (historical) The quarter-yard, divided into 4 nails, an obsolete English unit of length long used in the cloth trade
   5. (historical) The watch: A quarter of the night, nominally 3 hours but varying over the year.
      • 1526, William Tyndale, trans. Bible, Mark VI:

        And aboute the fourth quartre of the nyght, he cam unto them, walkinge apon the see [...].

   6. (heraldry) A charge occupying a fourth of a coat of arms, larger than a canton and normally on the upper dexter side, formed by a perpendicular line from the top meeting a horizontal line from the side.
   7. (basketball) A period into which a game is divided. (usually 8, 10 or 12 minutes according to the rules).
   8. quarterfinal
2. Any substantial fraction of something less than half, particularly:
   1. A division or section of a town or other area, whether or not it constituted a fourth of the whole.
   2. (usually in the plural) A living place, from which:
      1. (military slang, now rare) A quartermaster; a quartermaster sergeant.
         • 1925, Ford Madox Ford, “Parade's End”, in No More Parades, Penguin, published 2012, page 360:

           Tietjens said: ‘Send the Canadian sergeant-major to me at the double….’ to the quarter.

      2. (uncountable, obsolete except in phrase no quarter) Amity, friendship, concord; (now) accommodation given to a defeated opponent, mercy.
         • (Can we date this quote?), Shakespeare, (Please provide the book title or journal name):

           In quarter, and in terms like bride and groom.

         • (Can we date this quote?), Francis Bacon, (Please provide the book title or journal name):

           I knew two that were competitors for the secretary's place, […] and yet kept good quarter between themselves.

         • 1955, J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King, page 1110:

           Hard fighting and long labour they had still; for the Southrons were bold men and grim, and fierce in despair, and the Easterlings were strong and war-hardened and asked for no quarter.

   3. The part on either side of a horse's hoof between the toe and heel, the side of its coffin.
      • 1877, Anna Sewell, chapter 23, in Black Beauty‎:

        […] at last she kicked right over the carriage pole and fell down, after giving me a severe blow on my near quarter.

   4. (nautical) The aftmost part of a vessel's side, roughly from the last mast to the stern.

• (one of four equal parts): fourth, fourth part, ¼
• (period of three consecutive months): trimester
• (section of a town): district; ward; neighborhood; ghetto (pejorative); borough (New York City); capitoulate (Toulouse, historical)

• quart

quarter (third-person singular simple present quarters, present participle quartering, simple past and past participle quartered)

1. (transitive) To divide into quarters; to divide by four.
2. (transitive) To provide housing for military personnel or other equipment.

   Quarter the horses in the third stable.

3. (intransitive) To lodge; to have a temporary residence.
4. (transitive) To quartersaw.
   • 1758, Thomas Hale, A Compleat Body Of Husbandry, page 333:

     But there is, as in other woods, a great deal of difference between this and the quartered timber.

• (to have a temporary residence): stay over, stop; See also Thesaurus:sojourn

• quadruple (multiply by four)

• draw and quarter

Adjective

• "quarter" at Merriam-Webster
• "quarter" in Harrap's Shorter, 2006, p. 761

Borrowed from French cartayer.

quarter (third-person singular simple present quarters, present participle quartering, simple past and past participle quartered)

1. (obsolete) To drive a carriage so as to prevent the wheels from going into the ruts, or so that a rut shall be between the wheels.
   • (Can we date this quote?) De Quincey.:

     Every creature that met us would rely on us for quartering

From Latin quartus

• (Balearic) IPA^(key): /kwəɾˈte/
• (Central) IPA^(key): /kwərˈte/
• (Valencian) IPA^(key): /kwaɾˈteɾ/

quarter m (plural quarters)

1. fourth
2. quarter

• quart

From English

• IPA^(key): /kwaʁ.tɛʁ/

quarter m (plural quarters)

1. quarter (old measure of corn)

• “quarter” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

• traquer

• quartier (chiefly mainland Europe)

quarter m (oblique plural quarters, nominative singular quarters, nominative plural quarter)

1. (chiefly Anglo-Norman) quarter (one fourth)

• quarter on the Anglo-Norman On-Line Hub
• Godefroy, Frédéric, Dictionnaire de l'ancienne langue française et de tous ses dialectes du IX^e au XV^e siècle (1881) (quartier, supplement)